There are some talks about revitalising the river front of Amdavad, which is rotting away into nothingness. I heard recently that Modi and Co. are planning to build some 10 to 15 "tall buildings" in the city to make it at par with the "best".

Amdavad has a large economy and huge potential. It is more cosmopolitan than most ppl can even think of. Whether these plans see the light of day is yet to be seen however, but atleast there are some concrete plans to build a new airport.

THE Narmada may not be synonymous with Ahmedabad the way the Yamuna is with Delhi or the Hooghly is with Kolkata. But then, neither is beauty or greenery or riverfront views. Yet, thanks to the Narmada, all three are going to be part of the Ahmedabad experience very soon.

Nine decades after Gandhiji’s Satyagraha Ashram put the Sabarmati on the world map, the river—now fed by the waters of the Narmada—is returning to the centrestage as the hub of the riverfront development project even as Ahmedabad, notorious for its pollution levels, is getting a new identity.

With the Sabarmati currently resembling a nullah, with 32 canals dumping chemical effluent and sewage into the river and slums lining the banks, it’s only Aga Khan-awardwinning architect Bimal Patel who can see in his mind’s eye, ‘‘No concrete, but large swathes of green, half-a-dozen gardens and parks, where you can sit and soak in the scenery. The water will be very clean and certainly won’t stink, as it does now. More than 60 per cent of the riverfront will have large green spaces, it is going to be one beautiful canvas.’’

20-20 Vision
APART from the green spaces, the 20.5-km stretch of the Sabarmati riverfront from the Vasna barrage to the Narmada main canal near Gandhinagar will have heritage corners, boulevards, promenades and walkways. While all these developments will be at an elevation along the east and west banks, the river-level will be taken up by walking and jogging tracks and park benches where the river can actually lap at the feet.

Since the breadth of the river bed varies, land is being reclaimed to ensure a uniform riverfront width of 280 meters. This implies the removal of all the garbage dumps, open-air toilets and slums that have encroached on the river right upto the dry river bed.

An interceptor pipeline is being laid along the east bank. All the existing gutter pipelines will be connected to it for eventual disgorgement at the Pirana sewage treatment plant,’’ says Ahmedabad Municipal Commissioner Anil Mukim.

‘‘The slum-dwellers are being relocated to three different sites equipped with basic facilities. So far we have had no problem with them,’’ he adds.

Built to Fit
IN the first phase, an 11-km stretch on either side of the river is being developed at a cost of Rs 550 crore. At a later stage, says the city commissioner, plots on 34 hectares of the total 162.80 hectares reclaimed will be sold for commercial and residential use.

French Connection
JUST as the Ahmedabad Textile Industry Research Association’s (ATIRA) building bears the stamp of French architect Le Corbusier, the Sabarmati riverfront, too, has a French connection. The riverfront idea was first floated in 1961 by French architect Bernard Kohn, then residing in the city.

Probably sensing the urgent need for the riverfront to provide an identity to the city, Chief Minister Narendra Modi, after laying the foundation stone on April 12, 2003, gave a deadline of 1,000 days instead of the original five years. The Rs 1,200-crore project is being executed by the special purpose vehicle Sabarmati River Front Development Corporation Ltd.

DUST BUSTERS: Mission ENDURE (ENsuring DUst REduction), a Rs 105-crore project launched in July 2003 by city-based NGO National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL) and AMC, is paying off. ‘‘Unpaved road shoulders and footpaths created a lot of dust. With ENDURE, we have paved more than 56,000 sq m of road shoulders in the city, starting with areas in front of schools and hospitals,’’ says NCCL president V K Saxena. The process is simple: After AMC clearances, NCCL digs up six inches soil from the road level and, after a round of watering, prepares a two-inch bed of sand. Then it fixes pre-cast cement concrete interlocking blocks to make the pavement.

BUILDING BRIDGES: By December 2006, the city will have three new bridges across the Sabarmati, in addition to the five that already exist, and five flyovers in the city. The bridges will connect Vasna with Behrampura, Wadaj with Dhudeshwar and Hasnol with the Sabarmati area. The AMC is building flyovers at Om Society in Naroda, Dakshini Society in Maninagar and Shreyas Foundation in Vasna, while the Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority has identified bottlenecks on the main ring road at AEC junction, Memnagar junction and Shivranjani junction. Each flyover will have the two middle lanes reserved for the Bus Mass Rapid Transport System.

BUS PASS : To improve and enhance the capacity of the public transport system in the city, the AMC is also considering the Bus Mass Rapid Transport System, involving a 60-km circular road exclusive to buses and buses on feeder routes.

STREET SMART: The AMC’s Rs 150-crore Integrated Street Development Project identifies, according to Municipal Commissioner Anil Mukim, ‘‘about 140 km of important roads, which will be redesigned with an eye to better engineering, pavements, parking space, signages and street lighting and, most importantly, bicycle tracks to ensure the safety of cyclists as mainstream traffic becomes heavier and faster’’.

yeah ahmedabad's riverside has a lot of potential. It looks particularly good at night at the moment with the current residential and hotel highrises. If some commerical development supplements that, than wow.

Yes its Multiplex cum mall spread over 2,50,000 sq ft with 6 theatres, shops, food court,book store, music store, a bowling alley, restaurants and is a Zee groups chain which is being set up all around India. Ahmedabad was the 1st city it started with and its currently present in Chandigarh, Delhi and Mumbai.. Other cities where it will open soon are Bangalore, Hyderabad, Indore, Surat, Pune, Lucknow and one more in Mumbai.

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Yes its a multiplex. Me and my freinds used to go there to celebrate stuff. Its a bit steep tho, Rs 12 for a cup of coffee. Despite its problems, I would say Ahmedabad has a better infra than a large number of Indian cities. Gujju cities are among the best in India. Cities like Baroda or Surat, tho 'small' are so cosmopoliton.

Last edited by centralized pandemonium; December 21st, 2005 at 04:59 PM.

Ahmedabad is looking good indeed! Have a few pix of IIM Ahmedabad - the city's most famous educational institution - will post them soon...if I can find them... Keep going guys!

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